Blanche monologue (Act 2) — The climbers : $b A play in four acts

Oh, that present has almost been my death! Men are so hard to find things for! I had put in a gold pencil for his key chain, but to-night while we were eating our oysters, I saw him show a beauty that his mother had given him this morning! So I whispered to Jordan between the soup and fish to change Mr. Ryder's name to Mr. Trotter's stocking, and put Mr. Trotter's name on the one that had a cigarette case in it. I sneaked a message down to Dick on my dinner card--was it all right?--and he sent back word during the game that Trotter only smoked cigars; so before the ices were passed I shuffled Mr. Trotter's and Mr. Mason's names,--I'd given Mason the cigar case,--and just as Jordan signalled to me the transfer had been successfully effected, I heard Trotter casually observe he'd been obliged to give up smoking entirely--_doctor's orders_!